Zombies: Return of the Stupid Dead

Zombies. I can’t stand them. Drooling, dripping, devoid of any redeeming qualities. (You can tell them apart from politicians because zombies are better conversationalists.) Chris reminded me of my general disgust with zombies over here, and I wanted to take a minute exploring that. Yes, this started out as a joke post, but I realized that I’ve been reading some Silent Hill reviews by Shamus over at Twenty Sided, and figured that there’s a serious bit of game design analysis to be unearthed here.

It’s funny; I’ll never play one of the so-called “horror” games, and I don’t watch horror movies. Reading Shamus’ articles on Silent Hill, though, I do find that there are some solid game design principles that such games are uniquely poised to take advantage of. Before that, though, Zombies…

One, gore isn’t scary. It’s stupid, crass and gross. It has shock “value”, but it’s lowest common denominator value. Truly scary things don’t need gore. They often don’t even need to be seen. We’ve lost much since the days of Edgar Allen Poe and Alfred Hitchcock. (Yes, I know they used gore on occasion, but the terror they tried to convey wasn’t rooted in the gore, it was rooted elsewhere.)

Two, zombies are obvious. The shambling dead, creeping dread, “we’re coming to get your braiiiiiins” schtick just doesn’t instill much real fear. Yes, there’s some fear to be found in an utterly relentless and completely invincible foe, but zombies just don’t do it right. Sure, they mindlessly pursue fresh edibles, but they are typically not invincible. Also, they are typically very obvious about their intentions. Subtle they aren’t. More often than not, a foe is truly chilling when they come in the guise of a friend, with hidden intentions, and act with utter disregard for established rules of conduct or morality. We fear the “backstab” not because a zombie is (obviously) sneaking up behind us, but because we expect one thing and get another.

Three, desensitization. Wes Craven is no Hitchcock. Showing the gore, or proclaiming the “doooom” of the protagonist in grand, bloody terms isn’t scary, it’s stupid. The unknown is scary. The almost-seen or barely heard monster can conjure more darkness and fear from the imagination than any special effects house could ever muster, even with millions of dollars. Slasher porn (sadistically obsessing over brutal murders) isn’t scary, it isn’t entertaining, it’s pure shock therapy. The trouble with shock therapy, like drug use, is that we build up resistance to it. Druggies have to take ever-increasing hits of their chosen poison to get the same “high”. Walking the path to ever-increasingly spectacular murder, glorifying it in fine detail, destroys any sense of propriety in the viewer, and dulls sensitivity and morals, even as it builds the expectation of further depths of depravity. Zombies used to be merely heavily drugged people who were presumed dead, but were actually quite alive, albeit in deep stupors. (Losing one’s mind is terrifying; seeing a loved one lose their mind is sometimes even more so.) In the last few decades, zombies have slid into stupid territory, pushing for that ephemeral thrill factor.

There’s the whole “Uncanny Valley” effect that zombies used to tap into. There are few things as terrifying as the familiar that is somehow a little “off”. Imagine waking up in your room in the morning, but the shadows are wrong. When you open the window, the fifty year old tree in the yard has somehow moved ten yards closer to the house. Nothing else is obviously different, and the tree looks like it’s always been there. Are you losing your mind? Are your memories faulty? Are you even really home? Suddenly your notion of your home being a safe haven is blown away, as you never know what else might be wrong, and more importantly, why it’s wrong. Moving on in your day, if you went to the kitchen and your wife (or husband, whatever) was up like she always is… but moving a little stiffly, wouldn’t you hesitate? Maybe she says something a little differently, or acts like she’s left handed when she’s been right handed all her life. Pretty soon, even the smallest things set off paranoia, and nothing seems right any more. That’s effective terror, and it doesn’t require any blood, gore, profanity, nudity, shock or stupidity. Just a little careful tweaking of expectations, and the illusion of predictability that humans thrive on is shattered. Trust is blown, and even the mundane, normal aspects of life can take on new, scary meanings.

This is, not coincidentally, why dementia, Alzheimer’s and insanity are so terrifying. Psychological terror is so much more effective than slasher porn. Zombies have gone to the stupid side, and in so doing, have lost much of their potency and potential to actually be scary.

So what about game design? Shamus argues that “survival horror” games require some of the strongest design, and provide the greatest challenges for designers. It makes a lot of sense; building that sense of “not quite right” and nursing it slowly into outright fear and terror takes a deft hand, subtlety, and careful work. Save points, “gotcha” moments, drooling monsters, gore, profanity and such are very blunt instruments. While they can be effective at creating some level of jumpiness, more often than not, “gotchas” create frustration, monsters (especially if animated poorly) create mindless combat, and gore and profanity suggest that the devs are simply trying too hard to be scary, rather than allowing the player to feel scared.

Terror is being unable to control your own destiny, especially when you think you have things under control. Nintendo’s Eternal Darkness played with this, even extending the “insanity” to the player, messing with controls, lighting, system stability and such. Some of that reminded players that they were playing a game, but the fear was real because players felt something was at risk that really shouldn’t have been. It’s that “messing with expectations” that creates real responses in the player, not throwing another decapitated corpse in their way.

Game designers want to elicit responses in the players. Telling a story is only as good as how people understand and react to it. Games have vast potential to tell deep and compelling stories, because they are interactive. As designers, we have to be able to reach past the cheap thrills and offer something of substance. Games are unique in that the illusion of control is what they are built on, and the manipulation of that expectation is what terror is built on. Games have a huge amount of control to do that manipulation, more than any other form of entertainment. Going the cheap thrill route is lazy design.

Beyond all that, my personal style is far removed from the notion of instilling terror into the player’s mind, but I know how to do so. I’d rather teach or give my audience something uplifting, which is a big part of my opposition to zombies and “horror” content. Still, it’s helpful to understand how these things work, so as not to accidentally instill terror when none should exist. (The corollary being, if you’re trying to create terror, you don’t want people to laugh or get frustrated with stupid design decisions.)

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13 Responses

Nice post! Even though you hate zombies, the System Shock 2 variety were very interesting. There was something really unsettling about the fact that they told you they were sorry when they tried to shoot you. Since they were still concious enough to see you and warn you, but not able to control their muscles (as they were infected by a parasite), it made shooting them a lot more emotional.

It’s interesting… it’s not so much the unsettling or truly scary stuff that bothers me (except for that whole “I’d rather uplift than scare”), it’s the cheap thrills of gore, profanity and the like. It’s just lazy to me, setting aside my moral or squeamish concerns.

Going to the work of making that sort of SS2 “zombie”, where there’s just something horrific about somebody losing control, is good design in my eyes… even if it’s not necessarily the sort of game I’d really enjoy playing. Thanks for the example! I’m not familiar with SS2, but I’ve heard it’s an impressive forerunner for the much-ballyhooed Bioshock. Getting players to think and feel is key to the whole experience of a game, and that sounds particularly effective.

Go download the L4D demo (free off steam) and play through the first two levels. Tell me you don’t jump and get scared at least once. Set the ambiance properly (sound, dim the lights) and try to escape the zombie apocalypse.

Of course, we are crossing the streams a bit with video game zombies and movie zombies, and genres in fear and terror tactics.

Movie zombies are of course the gore fest you mention once they catch their ‘prey’, however the catch part isn’t the scary part – it is the relentless enemy in search of satisfying an internal, unquenchable, hunger. It definitely isn’t captured properly all the time, but done well bodes well for the cheap thrills. The gore is the dessert to the main course (and poorly done).

Video game zombies are no dumber than Illdian, or any major raid boss in any MMO. Predictable and killable. Difference is when you slay the dragon you stand around and argue about loot. In a zombie game when you are arguing about loot 10 zombies pop out from behind the curtain and attack you.

Again, go play the L4D demo and see how zombies are used as a frightening story element and are well done. Here’s a tip – watch your back =)

Intelligent horror, fear, much how you describe is very well done and thought out – and I will give you that. The slippery slope of the psychosis of unexpected change works for the most part but demands an expected level of intelligence from the player to be effective. Traditional scare and gore tactics are more marketable – which isn’t an excuse not to explore them further, but I just think a universally accepted zombie thriller done right has a strong position in the market. It just hasn’t been done right yet.

Chris, it’s just that being startled and grossed out isn’t really scary in my book. It’s good for a quick adrenaline kick, absolutely. I can’t and won’t argue that. It’s just so… cheap compared to really working to build that fear and terror.

Perhaps it’s merely a semantic distinction; “scare” to me is about fear and psychological trauma, no so much about the “boo!Gotcha!” moment. Both are certainly amenable to game mechanics, it’s just that the gotcha is rather shallow. It’s like playing the arcade “House of the Dead”; at some point, it’s just shooting targets that happen to be these ugly shambling things. It’s not really scary, it’s just stylish. (A style I happen to dislike.)

I also think of the guy with the hockey mask and a chainsaw in the corn maze. Some people run screaming from him. My sister and I have a different reaction. We are startled sure, especially if we’re not paying attention, but we’re not scared. We’re annoyed, and if he presses in, we’re just as likely to beat the crap out of him as anything, chainsaw notwithstanding. I don’t think that’s what they are aiming for.

Then again, such is a half decent starting point for a zombie game built around making players want to destroy the creatures. It’s just… making players mad or annoyed at the zombies is one thing, making them truly frightened of them is another. It may just be a fine distinction, and a shading of the “fight or flight” mechanic, but in my book, if you’re building a game based on horror, the goal should be to really instill terror or fear in the player, not prompt them to bust out a chainsaw and go all Bruce Campbell on the mobs.

Zombies can definitely be used to demonstrate the relentless insatiable enemy (good call on that). I hear there’s a Resident Evil Nemesis that does something like that. It’s just… even Nemesis is more scary because of what he does rather than how he looks. It’s like the Pyramid Head boss in Silent Hill (according to Shamus, anywho); the player cannot stop him or even hurt him. The best the player can do is escape. He’s not scary because he jumps out of a closet with a machete and blood spurting from his fingernails (obviously just making stuff up there), he’s scary because he’s utterly unstoppable.

To that end, zombies can indeed be scary. It’s just that it’s the inevitability and loss of control that are scarier than the zombies. The inevitable impending doom is scarier than when the “dessert” is consumed. It’s sort of like the feeling of a really good sneeze; the buildup is a stronger feeling than just blasting the stuff out there.

Zombies can be a means to an end, in other words. In my book, they aren’t as effective as other means, but I agree that they can be wielded as tools.

You’re right, shock tactics are more marketable. They are just so… dumb and shallow to me, a guy who’s always looking to advance the state of the art, rather than angle for the marketable. 😉

It’s not that I’m really disagreeing with you, I just see zombies as an epitome of the very blunt instruments of gore, shock and gotchas. They work… but is that really all that devs have to offer?

I’m looking forward to seeing what you come up with regarding zombies. As noted, it’ll likely not be a game I’d like to play, exactly, but from a design standpoint, I’m certain that you could do more with them than has been done so far.

Oh, and I got a good chuckle out of Zombie Illidan. You’re absolutely right; WoW raid bosses are pretty brainless. The loot argument is dead on as well; survival horror games would totally stall if loot were a major mechanic.

We’ve lost much since the days of Edgar Allen Poe and Alfred Hitchcock. /Agree

I know this is a gaming post, but I can’t help but comment on how many of your fine points in this post can be applied to the film industry as well. A friend of mine is really into the SAW series. He claims that SAW set the bar for horror and the plot twists at the end are the best part; the gore is just garnish. I stopped watching the SAW franchise after the 3rd movie because the designers went from a clever plot to nothing but gore imo. The first movie, while brutal, had one of the best endings I have seen other than Fight Club or The Usual Suspects and I’m big on movies that aren’t predictable to the end.

One of the most frightening movies I have ever watched is A Beautiful Mind starring Russell Crowe. Losing your mind IS probably the most frightening thing that can happen to an individual, so when it happens to someone else, the viewer is left with a very unsettling feeling despite being “sane”. I won’t ruin the movie if you haven’t watched it yet, but If you haven’t, I highly recommend picking it up because it is certainly worth watching.

I didn’t set out thinking about film, but considering that my BFA degree was based on film storytelling and visuals, I guess it’s no surprise. Games that want a strong story have a lot to learn from film. (Visuals have a lot to learn, too, but that’s another post.)

I have been meaning to watch A Beautiful Mind… maybe I’ll pick it up when I get a day off… and when we’re done watching Monk on DVD. Monk is another interesting psych case; a brilliant OCD detective… and an episode in the first season has him in the asylum. Asylums are sad, scary places, and that’s just the real ones. You don’t need to go to Silent Hill to be uncomfortable in an asylum.

…I suppose that with a bit more reflection, it’s no so much zombies themselves that I dislike, it’s the lowest common denominator approach they typically embody, complete with the gore, profanity and stupidity. I find myself agreeing with Chris that they could indeed be great in a story if they are used properly.

Thanks for the input, all! For a post that started out as a purposely exaggerated stance against zombies, I’ve found some surprisingly interesting things to think about. (Including some religious tangents which I probably won’t bore you all with… it’s interesting where my thoughts go sometimes.)

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I’m right with you there, Tesh. I’m not a big fan of gorefest either and prefers when things are subtle. And even then, I rarely go to horror movies, because my imagination goes into overdrive and I can’t sleep for weeks after that.

I remember watching “They” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_(2002_film)) somewhere in 2002. The strength of that movie was that, for 80% of the movie, you didn’t see the creatures. You heard them, creepy-crawling across the places. You got glimpses of something combining arachnoid, insect-like appendages and a slimy exterior. I was scared out of my mind and had trouble entering dark rooms for 3 months after that when I heard a noise in them !

Sudden shocks, I think are cheap to produce, as you say, but also cheap to react to. You don’t need to think about it, you just react. And most everybody reacts the same way. But the subtle “off” things? That’s not so easy… You need people to see them, feel them, and some people are just oblivious to details. I like the Alien movie for the same reason, and many of my friends only react by saying “there’s nothing scary, there’s nothing to see!”

As for games… The only ones I tried of that genre were Silent Hills and Resident Evil. Resident Evil never did anything for me, except the “Boo” moment of those zombie arms through the barred window (which was a great moment, still).
But Silent Hill…
I distinctly remember the beginning of SH2, I think, when I was walking in that street, and the only light came from my lighter. And suddenly, that squeaking noise began, and never stopped: I discovered it was the wheel of an overturned wheelchair. That sound was incredibly unnerving…
And later in the game, there was the static from the radio whenever a creature was near. Hearing that static come and go made my adrenaline pump constantly. It was physically exhausting !

So I think expectations plays a big role in being afraid. Associating a sound, a shadow, a movement with a danger, and knowing that you can never be SURE they are associated, that’s one of the things that makes people afraid. But pulling it off? That’s not so easy…

True, Modran, it’s not nearly so easy to pull off as the gotcha moments. As has been noted, psych horror requires more work from both the storyteller and the player/viewer. As Chris rightly notes, that’s just not as marketable. It’s no surprise that we don’t see more of that.

It’s strange. I’m not the target audience for horror, but I find myself wishing for it to be done better. Odd that I’d care about the state of the art for an art style that I don’t care for.

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